This invention relates to portable reels and/or spools for storing, protecting, and transporting electrical and electronic cables and cords, such as microphone cables, speaker cables, and other wiring cables and cords for audio and video applications. The invention is more particularly concerned with improved design for reels used for winding, storing, and transporting cables of the type that have an elongated cable body and cable connectors at a leading end and at a trailing end. It is important that the cables be kept organized and un-tangled during set up, take down and transport, and that the cables, especially the connectors, be kept safe from possible damage e.g., from crushing or bending.
A need has long existed for a convenient, simple, and light-weight cable storage device, especially in portable audio work, e.g., in which numerous electrified musical or audio instruments such as guitars, microphones, amplifiers, and speakers need to be set up for a performance, and then quickly and efficiently taken down and packed up after a performance. Each of these items has at least one associated cable or cord, and these have to be unpacked and re-packed, properly identified, and kept free of damage. As of now, no existing spool, reel, or other cable storage device has been able to fulfill these objectives.
Numerous reels have been proposed for power cords, for garden hoses, for clotheslines or ropes, but none of these has been adapted for electronic cables and none would satisfy the objectives as mentioned just above.